Social Reformer. He was the founder of the Society for the Suppression of Vice, and was the father of the Comstock laws (1873) enacted in order to exclude obscene matter from the mails. In his various campaigns, he caused the arrest of more than 3,000 persons and destroyed 15 tons of books, 284,000 pounds of steretyped plates for printing objectionable books, and nearly 4,000,000 pictures. In 1905, after Comstock had alerted the New York police to the content of George Bernard Shaw's play Mrs. Warrens Profession, Shaw observed that "Comstockery is the world's standing joke at the expense of the United States." Comstockery thus entered the English language, defined in Webster's as "strict censorship of materials considered obscene." (bio by: Joe Fodor)